ÍVIÐIA
by morgianesff
Summary: (#2 OF SERIES) This story is part of several prequels that will lead up to the events in 'That Which Wander is Unaware'. It centers on Arnora's early days on Midgard, and the hard choices she has to make to keep going.
1. Chapter 1

So it goes with saying that only things I own with any connection to MARVEL I bought on Ebay or Etsy. MARVEL COMICS & MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE are their own creatures and I have nothing to do with either of them aside from the fact I enjoy reading or watching them, and am grateful for the ability to play in their world. I claim nothing, and I receive nothing for this, expect the pleasure of putting something out into the world.

This story is part of several prequels leading up to That Which Wanders is Unaware. The sequel to TWWiU will be updated every week, but the prequels will be updated is I get to them.

You can also find this story on ARCHIVE OF OUR OWN under the same title and pen name.

Don't forget to check out the Photobucket album by searching the title of this story and my user name.

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CHAPTER ONE

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TYSDAGR, GÓI 30TH 1410

TUESDAY, MARCH 13TH 1410

1001 HOURS

VESTFOLD, NORWAY

SANDEFJORD

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ARNORA

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Strings of bones. Banners of red and dull white. Feathers tied high around the trunks of trees. My world was the scent of pine needles and blood. The former more offensive to me then the last, because it reminded me of a world I would never see again.

I did it for the kingdom. I told myself I was doing it for my family, for the honor and pride of my bloodline. But those were just the comforts of illusions, there to hide the fact that if I did not serve willingly, I would do it in chains from within a cage. A cage I surrendered so quickly I never truly saw it.

I did everything in my life for the kingdom, and they refused me just as much.

 _"If you forget these delusions of shadows and murder, I will allow you to remain in Asgard and to continue your service to the realm. What say you?"_ Had I the means, my rage was great enough that I would have killed them all on that bridge. Starting with Odin.

Delusions of shadows and murder he said. The shadow he spoke of, it caught me by the neck once, and left a curse there that almost crushed my throat into my bones! It did this to me in his own hall, in his son's own presence.

Loki. I want to kill him too. I followed him, I served him, and I loved him. _Those words were not and now shall never be spoken._ I did as he asked, I stood at his side first as one of his servants, then as he slowly promoted me to his personal retainer. If ever there was anyone I truly served of my own volition, it was him. I was loyal and steadfast. I defended his name, and even kept his secrets! Loki was there when the shadow curled its fingers around my skin, and he spoke as if my life held no regard!

"Perhaps killing a servant of the All-Father's household in his household is not the wisest choice, unless of course the idea was to draw his attention now?" His words were casual and his face calm, right up until the shadow vanished, but its grip remained. Then Loki's face was one of panic, and his hands bleed as he used strength to overcome sorcery!

I almost died, but as I stood before Odin I did as my master asked. I said nothing of the conversation I saw him having with that thing. I said nothing of the familiarity they clearly shared. I said nothing of my suspicions, and I let the blame fall on someone else. I let that shadow walk unhindered because I was loyal, and I trusted my Prince. Then I felt that magick on my baby as she laid so still in her cradle!

That thing cursed my child! That thing Loki was scheming with! It came into my home, into my room! It stood over my child as I slept, and it CURSED MY BABY! I carry the blood of Eir, and the knowledge of her teachings. I could still feel her there, just the tiniest little spark of life clinging to the edges, and fueling my desperation!

I broke into Loki's library and I looked for the right books. If I could not heal my daughter quick enough to stop the curse, I would find a way to bring her soul back after she died! I would make a new body for her if I had too, but I would not let her die! I knew necromancy was forbidden. We venerate death on Asgard, to bring someone back from Valhalla is like chaining a whale inches above the water. It is cruel and monstrous according to our society. But I am sixteen, and Kenna is my first born child!

Loki called the guards because he thought I was a thief. By the time he realized who I was it was too late. The guards were there, and they had the orders of Odin behind them now. Loki's commands were ignored, and I was dragged away screaming as my daughter was torn from me and left in his hands!

I was taken before Odin, and as I spoke, as I begged, I could see it. I said a figure in a cloak, a person whose face was hidden by a shadow too thick to be anything but a spell, came and put a curse on my child. I saw it in his face with every word. He knew! He knew what killed my daughter. He knew what tried to kill me, he what Loki was conspiring with. I asked for one thing from the kingdom I dedicated my life to, and the kingdom said no.

Odin chose to let my child die, and threw me in prison to protect the secrets of his family! Odin probably would have executed me too if it was not for the fame of the 'heir of Eir'. My sudden disappearance would not go unnoticed. It gave them time to persuade the king.

Frigga, the Queen herself spoke on my behalf. So did my family. So did Loki, accomplice to murder that he was. They persuaded Odin to give me mercy. And I spat on it. He told me if I forgot my delusions of shadows and murder, he would allow you to remain in Asgard and to continue my service to the realm and I told him I hoped it came back and took him first.

I wanted them to kill me! My kingdom, my prince, everything I dedicated my life to both betrayed me! Even my own husband, the father of my child betrayed me! Randulfr, father of Kenna, the daughter I fought so hard to save, left me to fight alone! She was his child as much as mine, but he just stood there in silence. He chose his king over his kin. I always knew marrying an Einharajar meant I might lose him one day, but I never imagined it would be like this!

I wanted them to kill me, and they banished me instead. I felt the Bifrost hum under my feet, and then beneath those feet I felt rock and pine needles, and that is where I stayed.

I have been here ever since, waiting. I saw the light from the Bifrost appear again in the distance not long after it left me. I thought perhaps Odin sent my murderer after all. That my death was walking in my direction with an axe, now that there was no one to witness the crime. No one would ever know, they would all think Odin was merciful and gave me a chance, they would all think each year I did not return was my own fault. I did not care what they thought, I just wanted my executioner to hurry and find me.

That was more then a month ago, and who found me was a human instead. There was nothing special about her to me. She was just a woman with brown hair, wearing a gray dress with a brown apron, and filling a basket with herbs.

But to her, there was everything special about me. The Bifrost levels the land when it touches, and only what it touches. So she saw a foreign woman, dressed in foreign clothes. She saw a circle of knotwork that the snow did not touch. She saw a circle drawn by the Gods, surrounded by trees that had their sides shaved clean down to the very wood. She left, and part of me hoped she would not come back, but I knew she would, because getting what I want clearly was not my fate.

She brought back people. First she came back with a woman carrying a wand. Then more women. Then they came back with men in off white robes with shaved heads, and kohl staining their lips and eyes.

They wanted to know who I was. They wanted know why I came. I never said anything to them. They wanted my name, but all I wanted was to leave it behind. When I gave them nothing, they gave me a name they thought was fitting. There was an arrogance in that I know they did not mean. I should have been offended, but I lacked the strength to care. Íviðia was just a word, just a sequence of syllables. No matter what it meant, it really meant nothing.

The things they built for me meant nothing either. I sat through all of it in silence, hoping soon I would just fade away from hunger. It did not take me long to realize I had made the mistake of hoping again, and this wish too would never happen.

They built arches leading up to my clearing. They built a table. They built pens from branches. They decorated the trees with strings of bones, feathers, and banners of cloth. They decorated the site with worshipers. I had never been touched by so many people.

They came with prayers. Standing before their priests as they invoked the names of people who did nothing to deserve their worship, and then came to me with faces speckled in blood. They asked questions, made requests and kissed my skin.

I wonder what I must have seemed like to them. A young woman with strangely colored skin and eyes. My clothes were rags, but even those were finer then best among them. My body lived, even though I took no food or drink from them.

They did not know why I did not die, and I did not either. I just sat there quietly as they slit the throats of animals and hung them from the trees around me. It had been more then a month since I tasted food, and I felt in my flesh. I was starving, but I lived. Why did I live? Why would this cruelty continue? Why could I not just rest and find peace? Why could I not just be with my daughter again?

I took someone else's child to give my life purpose again.

At first the crowd was large. A Goddess had landed in their forest. Many came to see me. The drums and dancing, the drunken debauchery, it went on late into the night around me. They held celebration of life, in mockery, around a woman who wanted to die.

It was a relief when the crowds started thinning. Life on Midgard was harsh and unforgiving, even when the winter was not upon them. If they wanted to live through the year, they could not stay away from their homes just to watch a woman sit in the dirt.

That did not stop them all though, there was still the Völva who tended to me. A sacred class of women who practiced a magickal art. I understood that, and in a way I think she understood me. she saw the signs of grief on me as she dared to wash my skin, and comb my hair. She would have done that forever if I stayed. She was building houses nearby.

A woman came. Not one of the Völva, but just a woman from the village, with a large basket under her arm and a boy on her back. She came to seek blessings, and she brought a rooster as her sacrifice.

It was not the rooster that made me move. They had been killing animals all around me for a long time.

It was the way that baby kept being ignored. They had brought children to me before, but those children had been surrounded by crowds, and easy to ignore even when they were inches from me. There is no crowd now, just the mother, the child, the Priestess, and I, standing on my feet before them all.

None of them knew what to do, but least of all was the mother. I had been still for so long I doubt any of them expected it I could even stand at all. She might have considered my movement a sign of good fortune if it was not for the intensity in my eyes.

I hated that child! I hated the sound it was making! I hated the way it made me feel! The way all of this made me feel! I wanted death, I waited for it, but it just kept refusing to come! All I got was the sound of animals screaming day after day! I hated that even though she showed hesitation, when I held out my arms she put her son in them!

There was nothing special about this boy. He had brown hair and brown eyes, and he cried only because of the colic twisting in his stomach. I hated him for that, for being so weak and helpless, for being so like the child I failed.

I could not stand the way he giggled and squeezed his fat fingers around mine. I wanted to die, but I was so tired of wanting to die.

Odin sent me here hoping time and hardship would soften or kill me. It had not killed me yet, and I refuse to let it bend me to his will.

If I can not starve to death and waste away on this planet, then I will live. I will spend every day defying that bastard just by existing. I do not know how I will do it yet, but I will build another life, and someday I will find a way to make them pay!

Neither of them stopped me as I walked away. I know they wanted to but I think it was a combination of fear, and the fact that had to chase down that 'blessed' chicken. Its throat was half slit already, and the blood had drained so much it barely fluttered in the Völva's hand. When my fingers traced over its feathers it flailed back to life as she all but threw it in shock.

They probably will worship that bird now for all I know. I do not care. That child ruined everything.

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NOTES FOR THE READERS:

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Yes, I'm aware that the viking age ended long before the 1400's, however I would like to remind everyone that the MCU is only based on our universe. Therefore since the first Thor movie had the Frost giants attack a village that was clearly viking, in the 1400's I'm going to assume the viking age was still going and make adjustments accordingly while blending that detail is well is can with other history at the time.


	2. Chapter 2

So it goes with saying that only things I own with any connection to MARVEL I bought on Ebay or Etsy. MARVEL COMICS & MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE are their own creatures and I have nothing to do with either of them aside from the fact I enjoy reading or watching them, and am grateful for the ability to play in their world. I claim nothing, and I receive nothing for this, expect the pleasure of putting something out into the world.

This story is part of several prequels leading up to That Which Wanders is Unaware. The sequel to TWWiU will be updated every week, but the prequels will be updated is I get to them.

You can also find this story on ARCHIVE OF OUR OWN under the same title and pen name.

* * *

CHAPTER TWO

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FRJÁDAGR, HAUSTMÁNUÐUR 1ST 1415

FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 15TH 1415

1001 HOURS

VESTFOLD, NORWAY

SANDEFJORD

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ARNORA

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The next enemy to claim victory over me wasn't a 'God' or a King. It was a bear, squatting in my 'house'.

I didn't know their language in the beginning, but the Allspeak is a marvelous ability. Like many of Asgard's other accomplishments, the Apples of Idunn, for example, which alter the rate at which we age, the Allspeak is another enhancement granted to each of its citizens, though that is one we are born with. Its been part of Asgardian life for so many generations I can't even recall who created it, but is a highly refined example of nanite technology, capable of being passed on through the genetic code, which allows us to quickly learn a language, written or spoken, through exposure alone.

They called me Íviðia in their tongue, 'she who dwells in the wood', so that is what I set out to become.

I walked until I thought I could stop, hopeful though not entirely confident I'd found a place beyond the humans reach. I did not know enough of this land, of Midgard to dare at such confidence. In truth I knew almost nothing at all. Midgard may have been part of the nine realms but it held little interest to most in Asgard. Adventures, young warriors and hunters would frequent her soil for the taste and pleasure of the exotic but as for me, a healer destined to serve the royal family, the realm of the mortals was not a subject I ever thought I needed to put much study in. _I thought so many things, I made so many mistakes._

Listening to them had taught me their language, but there was no magickal ability to teach me the rest. I was stronger, smarter, longer lived then these people, yet so much less skilled.

I took DNA once, from several species. I separated them, isolated pieces of them, and blended them. I engineered into them a new species, and yet I could not figure out how to dig a hole that would not collapse.

The winter was settling in, the cold, that even I of Asgard couldn't help but feel. I needed shelter, a place of enough permanence to let me outlast the season.

It was nothing like Asgard, like my memories of camping. There were no spells to erect shelters, to summon lights and set up perimeters, I had none of these skills except my minor knowledge of temperature manipulation, the only good thing Loki left me with, that let me make fire.

I'd desperately hoped I could find some kind of cave or tunnel to take possession of, what little I knew of this place I thought that they should have been plentiful, but I should have known fate wouldn't allow that luxury. I finally gave up that search when I woke to the first signs of frost ahead of the dawn. If I couldn't find a shelter I'd have to start making one.

I never thought digging could be this difficult. Our tools made it so much less taxing, so much less frustrating. I lost count on how many times my efforts ended up collapsing in on themselves, mocking my bloody fingers before I figured out I needed to take additional steps, another skill I had to learn on the spot.

I would have to reinforce the walls and ceiling to prevent further collapse, and that meant I'd have to teach myself another skill yet again. There were fallen branches and trees I could use that were still strong enough to bear the weight I asked of them, but the problem was cutting them. I knew how to identify the plants and properties in them, but manipulating them was not a skill a healer needed to know.

I needed to find a way to chop and carve them into the size I needed, without a blade, or at least a decent one. I found a jagged rock strong enough withstand the abuse I put it through, stronger then the abuse I put my own flesh through. It didn't take long for the white interior of the wood I revealed to start turning red as I wore through my own skin, nothing but rags to protect my hands, and my own ability to heal, time and time again.

Eventually I had a hole big enough to fit three of me sitting down, and a door. Though the door was more of a movable wooden wall I made of planks, and skinny branches that I boiled until they were soft enough to use as rope.

It was drafty and cold, and if I needed to rely on solid fuel for all my fire it would have been smokey too. Thankfully I could make fire through magick to keep warm during the coldest of it, though I couldn't maintain it indefinitely. For things like cooking I needed to use wood. For things like cooking I needed food, I needed to venture out into the frozen world around me.

I was so hungry in the earliest days. There were no berries, or crops for me to pick at my leisure. I had to search, and rely on what pittance luck might offer me. Occasionally I'd find a feast, the stash of nuts the squirrels had hidden in a low hole on a tree. I always hoped for that, though more often I relied on what nutrition I could get from boiled tree bark, plants that were frozen under the snow, and what roots I could dig up on days when the sun was strong enough to thaw the earth just a little.

Thirst was just is much an issue. I had no cups or kettles. My only source of water, other then when I ventured across a stream, was what little snow I could melt and heat and the dip of a rock that was bowl, basin, and pot depending on my need.

Things improved when I realized I could kill the animals. I was no stranger to meat or hunting. I ate it often on Asgard, and is a Vanir hunting was not something I was unfamiliar with. However this was different, this was cheating in a away that bordered on cruel.

I noticed that animals when they were around me, how could I not when the sight of them made my stomach pangs grow, and the knowledge that I lacked the weapons to hunt them re-enter my mind. I still found there presence beneficial. Often if I followed them, they could lead me to their stashes, or kick up the ground far better then my soft fingers could.

Foreign as these animals were to me though, my familiarity with animals in general allowed me to pick up on it rather quickly. These animals may have been unfamiliar with Asgardians, but they had to be familiar enough with man to know wariness of my shape. Indeed I could see that in them as they maintained distance at my approach, but I also couldn't help notice that they didn't scatter entirely.

They were curious about me, comfortable, and if I tried I realized they could be coerced. Hunting was honorable. There was respect in the patience and pursuit, there was honor in allowing and accepting the challenge. When you hunted, when you killed, you were on equal terms even if you won. You and your prey both had the freedom to preserve their own life. This, was luring innocence to their own doom, and I wept.

It was a deer, a buck, a fawn with stubs for horns, and we found each other in a clearing both wanting the dandelion roots I planned to eat for supper.

Something had kicked up the snow rather thoroughly, and I took that as a hopeful sign I might find something under the ground. I had to heat my water and wet the soil to make it soft enough to dig through, doing my best to pretend that the cold and damp wasn't making my fingers painfully stiff. Ignoring that got easier when felt my fingers trace the edges of the prize I hoped for, a better one then I hoped for given how large dandelion roots grow.

I already had one out of the cluster when I saw it inch timidly out of the trees, its copper fur and spots making me truly confused as to how it got so close and stayed so unseen. It was skinny, even for winter, and the desperate fixation in its eyes told my why. It must have been separated from its herd or mother.

It didn't run when I lifted my hand. It should have. It didn't run, only retreated a step as I slowly stood from my knees in the dirt. It should have. It came closer until its nose was close enough to sniff the root in my hand, to nibble on it when I wouldn't surrender it completely. It didn't run as I carefully put my hand on its fur. It didn't run as I let my hands slide to caress its neck. Its hunger overcame its curiosity, and it trusted me because I fed it.

It couldn't run when I wrapped my arms around its neck, pulling it tight with my other arm and locking it in place. It couldn't run as I dropped all my weight on its neck, forcing half its body down against the dirt while enduring its struggles. It screamed as it kicked for purchase at the earth, and against my flesh. I snapped its neck, and held it, petting it in pointless comfort, crying an apology as I felt its chest collapse onto itself.

I gained food from that fawn. It was difficult, and far from expertly done but I skinned a pelt from it with the sharpest fragment of stone I could, and carved the meat off its bones, knowing enough to leave the organs and carcass where it lay to keep predators from following.

I kept its fur too, using a smooth stone to buff off what meat reminded from when I skinned it before drying it near the fire. It turned out stiff and I had to beat it to soften it enough to use as a cloak, but it was a means for warmth, and I did better the next time, and the time after that.

I didn't want to die, I didn't want starve, cold and alone in a hole in a hill. I wanted to live. I had to do it to live. I told myself that every time I lured an animal, improving on that too with practice, when I realized they were attracted to the sensation of my magick.

I survived the winter that way, and when spring came again, my hole in a hill was lined in furs and filled with bones.

Things became easier when things began to get warmer. All winter long I felt much like what I imagine winter did itself. I was just surviving, subsisting on what was necessary to continue my existence, but with the first signs of spring I felt myself coming back to life right along with the land around me.

The land grew around me, and I grew the land around me. I found what I recognized, are realms separate but not so different in many ways. The plants I knew by texture, taste, sight and scent I dug up and replanted near my hole. I watched some of them take root again with joy, and many more wither. I mourned their loss, but I learned from it.

The ground was hard, the soil shallow and poor, the seasons short. I learned my magick made them stronger. It took quite a few plants before I noticed. The more holes I dug the rawer my skin felt, the longer I dug, the more the earth scratched and scraped, and soaked up the blood from my knuckles. The holes coated in blood, in magick were the plants grew the best.

I strengthened roots at first. Then I learned I could break things down to improve the soil. And eventually I realized I could grow. I took a branch, fallen and rotted. Out of it I grew a sapling, a sapling that grew into a tree, a tree that bore a seed, and shed its leaves and died, a seed that grew a bigger tree. I did that first in a week, then following spring an a day, then the next an a hour. I had learned how to master the land.

I learned, but there were other things I knew. I knew how to cook in an earthen oven, and though I did not know how to build one, I knew what they should like, and how they should work, so trial and error perfected its construction. I knew that bee's would flee smoke, and that if I watched the birds carefully, I could find eggs. I knew that with patience, and good work I could even manage something that passed for flour. I wanted bread, I spent five years without the taste of it on my tongue, and I thought I deserved it, but then the land taught me the price of my arrogance.

This was not a land of magick, magick had a price here, and I had used too much too quickly. I exhausted myself using magick to grow hazelnut trees on a hill of pines, and I feel asleep gathering firewood. I told myself it would be fine, just to rest for a while in the shade. I gave nature, and fate an opportunity, and they taught me a lesson. No one deserves anything, and least of all me. It taught me that lesson with a bear.

I came back home, still tired but rested, dreaming of warm soft bread and honey, only to find the honey, and everything else lost to me. To preserve what I didn't eat right away, I wrapped it in hide, and buried it in my hole, which is why when I returned I was greeted with the sight of a bear's back peaking past my door, and the sound of it rooting out my stores with the pleasure that should have been mine.

When it notices me it was only my ability with fire magick, and the branches in my hand that stopped its charge and saved my throat. But not my life. My life was in that hole, and this stupid animal tore it from me as surely as if its claws finished their intentions. I could not defeat a bear, I lacked the tools and the abilities. Even as strong as I was its claws would rip through my flesh, in my lack of a blade or an arrow, and my failure to compel its trust and calm. She was a hungry predator and no amount of magick would change her opinion of me.

I lost everything, again. I would have to start over again. I would learn this lesson, again. I told myself it was fine, I knew what to do, I knew it better now, and it was Spring, not Fall crawling into Winter. I would do it better this time, and I would find what I needed for my damn bread still. Then I came across men again, and I came across the darkest pits inside them.


End file.
